Anatole France, who won the Nobel Prize in 1921, once said, "All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy, for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another."
Last weekend had its melancholy, and not just because the Colts were not in the Super Bowl. Its melancholy was that it marked the beginning of a series of major changes.
With fewer than 100 days until graduation, uncertainty and change abound. Last Saturday, my mom and I started to clean out my old room in preparation for my upcoming move to Arizona. The better part of Sunday was spent with my best friend from elementary school and her - gulp! - husband. My graduating class is planning a five-year reunion this fall.
Things are changing, and quickly - but not just in the life of this girl. The landscape of this university is changing. If we don't pay attention, we might wake up one day to a whole new Ball State University.
I am constantly amazed at how much has changed here in the last five years. When I arrived for orientation, the bookstore was in the L.A. Pittenger Student Center and the Art and Journalism Building was still under construction. Shafer Tower had no bells, most of the houses on the north side of Riverside Avenue bore different Greek letters than they do now, and Sept. 11 was just another day on the calendar.
Five years later, we find ourselves in the midst of a constantly evolving campus in a drastically different world. With a new Music Instruction Building, two building projects in the works and the beginning and upcoming continuation of "Extreme Makeover: McKinley Avenue Edition," none of my years at Ball State has been on a campus that looked exactly like it did any of the others.
We are in a transitional period in the life of the university. With the first female president of any state university in Indiana's history and an increasing need for innovation in higher education, we have seen and continue to see groundbreaking change.
The university is getting ready to roll out a new marketing campaign, as it has become much more than "Everything you need." And it has been able to become that by embracing and celebrating change.
Living in a perpetual construction site and never knowing what the next months will bring is not the easiest thing in the world, but change is integral to progress. Gaining and maintaining a competitive edge requires flexibility and understanding.
If, as an individual, I were resistant to change, I could never be prepared to pack up and move across the country two days after graduation. The last five years have brought about immense change in my personal life, but every step - no matter how difficult or uncomfortable - has brought me closer to a realization of my full potential as a human being.
Likewise, if Ball State were resistant to change, we would not need a new residence hall, have ranked programs in every academic college, be the No. 1 wireless campus in the nation or be planning for a massive expansion of recreation facilities. We certainly would not be competing enough with Indiana University to scare its marketing people into putting so many billboards so close to our campus.
Just as France said, we must die to one life before we can enter another. So, too, must Ball State. Gone are the days of the "party school" stigma.
What lies ahead? No one can say for sure, but if current trends continue, hopefully someday soon when students leave Muncie for spring break, people won't look at their T-shirts and ask, "What is Ball State?"
Those who protest the building and growth should consider the value of a Ball State degree. The better the institution gets, the more weight a degree from here will carry.
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